Compounds, compositions and formulations for protecting human beings from being bitten by mosquitoes are known in the art. Generally, these compounds, compositions and formulations are based on their ability to persist on the skin of the person upon topical or surface application for a time sufficient to repel mosquitoes. Numerous adjuvant materials have been added to mosquito repellents to increase the persistence of the repellents to the skin of a person. However, despite the various attempts to improve the repelling activity of the known mosquito repellents, these attempts have generally not been successful, as almost anyone who has used such mosquito repellents can attest.
Thus, the art has been searching for new and more effective repellents against mosquitoes. However, the search for more effective mosquito repellents has not generally been met with success since most mosquito repellents have been found only to possess a limited degree of repellency and are generally not particularly effective. There is, therefore, a need for more effective means to deter mosquitoes from even locating and biting humans and other targets such as livestock. Moreover, this need has recently become more acute and urgent because mosquitoes have been discovered to be carriers of significant diseases that can be passed on to a target by the mosquitoes biting the target. A further need is to be able to reduce the use of environmentally unfriendly pesticides.
In U.S. Pat. No. 4,933,371 there is a disclosure of using stock solutions of 2.5, 5 and 10 percent linalool in Tween 80 and water to kill mosquitoes. In contrast to this, the present invention does not want to kill mosquitoes. Rather, in the present invention the object is to prevent mosquitoes from sensing a target, not to kill them.